What you're watching

'Battlestar Galactica': The Tighs toast a final goodbye

March 18, 2009 | 5:49
pm

On "Battlestar Galactica," Cylon couple Saul and Ellen Tigh manage their troubles, which range from garden-variety marital discord to discovering they’re really members of a robotic race, by hitting the bottle.

Often.

So with the acclaimed Sci Fi Channel drama coming to an end Friday, the Canadian actors who portray the Tighs, Michael Hogan and Kate Vernon, took coping cues from their small-screen alter egos.

Over cigarettes and pale ale Monday night at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, Hogan said the pair was –- to use the show’s favorite curse word –- pretty "frakked up" about it. "I don't know if I'll ever be able to growl 'gods damnit' ever again," he said.

Vernon sipped Chardonnay and recalled how surreal it was playing Ellen, who was "ripped" during her entire first episode. "It was drunkalogue after drunkalogue after drunkalogue," she said.

"There seems to be this hidden supply of booze and cigarettes aboard
Battlestar Galactica. We're totally out of food, we're on the run, but
still we have booze," joked Hogan. "When Ellen came back, it was like,
thank God, we know we're going to have more booze."

Vernon was recently revealed to be the mother of all Cylons — "I'm the OctoCylon!" she said — and admitted difficulty letting go of the show. She's been hosting viewing parties for the final batch of episodes in her Sherman Oaks home for the show's Los Angeles-based cast and crew.

"Everybody on the show was a fan," she said."I love watching with the episodes with Michael. We hold hands and go, 'Awwww.'"

When the actress learned Sci Fi Channel would be changing its name to SyFy in hopes of appealing to a less geeky demographic, she scoffed. "It never even occurred to me that we were shooting a science-fiction show," she said. "Never. It's always been just good drama."